Fuck It
by Besina
Summary: John's been carrying a full load of Sherlock, in all his aggravating glory, for months now - all by himself. Something's gotta give.


Written by Besina  
May 10, 2013

Standard fanwork disclaimer.

A/N: Many thanks to AtlinMerrick for the comments and encouragement! This is meant to be a one-shot, no sequels or chapters - it's just how it wrote itself.

* * *

"No, Mycroft," John breathed. His world was spinning - he was on overload, and this? This was too much. Not again. Not on top of everything else.

No.

Just-

No.

He repeated that word again to Mycroft, shaking his head jerkily with each iteration, "No, no, no. No. I can't. No." It seemed he had lost the ability to say anything else, so he numbly hung up without waiting for a reply, and dropped down hopelessly into his chair.

John had been holding on by a thread. The past two months had not been easy: there had been unending rows; dangerous situations had Sherlock careening into them with no thought for his own safety, leaving John breathless and on edge trying to keep up; the nights not filled with perils galore ended with loud complaining and the slamming or breaking of several items around the flat; there seemed to be danger nights every other week; he'd had to make apologies for Sherlock more often than he could count, and smooth the way for even those who had been closest to the madman as he went out of his way to ruffle the feathers of Mrs Hudson, Lestrade and Molly - not to mention himself - but who ever looked out for him?

There had been incidents at the morgue; experiments gone wrong; dangerous, unlabelled, substances left around the flat and, worst of all, the dining area; an abundance of abuse, above and beyond his normal helpings, heaped on the entire staff of NSY; and Sherlock had nearly gotten himself permanently uninvited to any and all crime scenes _twice_! And that _didn't even include_ the many talkings-to he'd had to be in attendance for.

There'd been arguments between himself and Harry about his constant 'abuse' at the hands of Sherlock; another undoing of a promising relationship due to a cranky flatmate; above-average snarking betwixt the Holmes brothers; screeching violin abuse at all hours; Sherlock ignoring all attempts to feed him; sleepless nights worrying about the git; even more sleepless nights when said git had simply disappeared; and plenty of incidents which had required his medical skills.

John was at his wit's end.

And now Mycroft had called. Sherlock was bored again - out of his skull bored - and tonight was_ another_ danger night - god only knew why... _Couldn't the man keep them to once or twice a year? What was with this sudden influx of them?_ He hadn't had a decent night's sleep in _weeks_. There was no more he could do. No one he could call - everyone was fed up with the detective, and his care was falling exclusively to one very tired, very emotionally drained, worn-out doctor.

So he did the last thing he _could_ do.

He snapped.

* * *

After those words had left Mycroft's mouth, 'no' was the only one left in his vocabulary. Tears welled behind his eyes. He was so fucking tired!

_Danger night._

Fine.

Search the fucking flat. He slowly rose to his feet and went about the search, checking every place he could think of, plus those Mycroft had previously thought likely. After a good hour checking every nook and cranny in the flat, he flopped down into Sherlock's chair, exhausted and hoping to pass out, when something hard hit him in his lower back, causing a twinge in the already sore area.

He breathed out slowly and resignedly to see which of Sherlock's experiments he had inadvertently squished now, and to wonder about how much yelling there would be over it.

He didn't see anything behind him, but when his eyes focused, there was a bulge in the bottom part of the back cushion. He pulled it out from behind him and unzipped it, unwillingly inserting his hand into the unknown, hoping not to get acid burns, pokes, or possibly bitten, by whatever his flatmate had lodged there, but not caring enough anymore to get up and take precautions.

_Fate could do what it liked. Bugger it all._

His fingers came to rest on a long, smooth, wooden object. He pulled it out and looked at it as any hope left in his system fled. He couldn't even be arsed to get mad. It just figured. He stared at it some more. _Sherlock's stash... Great... Wonderful... What a perfect ending to an absolutely horrid day/week/month/two... _And suddenly he just didn't care anymore. He was empty, dry, run out...

He slumped back in the chair, casting the cushion onto the floor. It was uncomfortable, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered.

He stared at the box in his hands, then slowly, dreamily, and decisively, opened it. The tools inside were almost beautiful - antique and lovely - the syringe still shone, one dose of liquid already contained within the corked device. Another dose, two... _maybe_ even three, waiting in the stoppered glass bottle beside it. The lining was worn, red velvet, but it didn't look tattered or mangy - it managed a refined elegance of sorts.

John was a doctor, and although a tourniquet would make the job easier, and his belt was right at hand, he didn't bother. He could still get a vein. He pulled the cork from the end of the needle with his teeth and spat it onto the floor; pushed the tiny air bubbles out of the needle until a little bit of the fluid dribbled out. One-handedly, he unbuttoned his cuff and pushed up his sleeve.

Bleary, sleep-deprived eyes found a likely-looking vein and he pierced it with the needle, first try. He felt rather proud of himself and ignored the sting. Trance-like, he watched himself push in the plunger - felt the burn of the chemical - whatever it was - as it seeped into his veins.

He'd be amused to find out if it was cocaine or morphine. A little surprise for him, and _fuck_ if it wouldn't be a surprise for Sherlock. _Hellishly hard to get high when your doctor's injected your supply_. Giving that thought a once over, he took hold of the bottle, unstoppered it and poured it onto the floor. _There! That should take care of it._

His thoughts became muzzy - much moreso than before, even with his sleep-addled brain. He felt himself finally begin to drift off - so _that's_ what it had been! _Okay, that was fine - it's all fine_, he thought to himself with a bitter tang of humour. _He'd finally sleep._ His eyes fell shut and his hand dropped from the syringe which remained embedded in his arm as he blissfully joined the realm of Morpheus.

He didn't hear his mobile ring, or ring again, or any of the twenty-odd times it stopped then started again.

* * *

Sherlock had been in Manchester when a text had come from Mycroft. He'd rung before that, but Sherlock was intent on ignoring him. He finally gave in and glanced at the words on his phone. They simply said:

_Get home now. John sounds - wrong. I think he may be unwell. -M_

Sherlock had read the first part and couldn't stop himself from thinking, _Well of course John sounds wrong, he frequently _is_ wrong._ But the 'unwell' part threw him. John hadn't seemed ill at all when he'd left. A bit feisty maybe, but hardly coming down with anything. There was only one thing left for 'wrong' and 'unwell'. _Was he having a flashback? Oh dear..._

Sherlock boarded the first train he could. The time it took travelling had Sherlock pondering the rest of the meanings of the text. Mycroft was more likely to say someone sounded 'off' rather than 'wrong', so the turn of phrase had been deliberate. John obviously wasn't himself. _Was it Afghanistan? Had something else greatly upset him? Family, perhaps? Was he in danger with no other way of letting someone know other than simply sounding... wrong? Any number of criminals knew where they lived, and there were no shortage of them who had a bone to pick with Sherlock..._ His throat had gone dry.

He tried texting Mycroft back, but got no answer, which meant he was most likely in the middle of negotiations or preventing some country from exploding, or perhaps encouraging it to do so. Lestrade proved equally inaccessible - it had been the DI's day off and he'd taken to turning his phone off completely, saying if they needed him badly enough, they'd send a car. He'd be home before he could get Harry to their place, not to mention she wouldn't take kindly to being called by Sherlock. Molly wasn't answering either - a date perhaps? And Mrs Hudson... Mrs Hudson - yes, this was her poker night _(she called it bridge, but it was poker)_, and he'd never paid enough attention to retain whose house it was that she went to for the occasion.

When the train arrived, he hurled himself into the nearest taxi and shouted the address, which earned him a dirty look in the rear-view mirror, and likely an extra charge, but Sherlock didn't notice. Once they'd arrived, he stuffed a wad of bills in the driver's hand and tumbled out of the car as quickly as he could.

The outer door looked intact - that was good. He stormed up the stairs, two at a time, yelling for his flatmate. The door to the flat was closed but unlocked; he pushed it open warily, and stopped dead at the sight which greeted him.

* * *

John was slumped in Sherlock's chair, cushion thrown off to the side, eyes closed, his breathing shallow, and a..._ - Sherlock's -_ syringe poking ostentatiously from his arm - the box half open on the floor by his feet, having fallen there at some point.

His heart stopped for a moment as calculations sped through is mind. He already knew what they'd be telling him: John had overdosed. Perhaps not on purpose, and god only knew why he'd injected it - but even though Sherlock was leaner, he'd built up a tolerance over the years - nothing that a man like John could ever hope to manage.

_What on earth had possessed him?_

He bolted over to the chair, falling onto his knees as he pulled the needle from John's arm, then smacked the doctor across the face, multiple times. It felt cold and disturbingly damp as his palm made contact. John barely stirred. _What to do? What the hell to do?_ He couldn't seem to think.

_Had John tried to do himself in? Why? And why hadn't he noticed something was wrong? What do normal people do in this situation? ... Ambulance! Yes, ambulance! _His fingers flew to the number pad as he dialled and blurted out the details to the dispatcher.

He waited for long minutes beside the nearly comatose John, wondering unconsciously if this was, in fact, what it had been like when he'd been using... It certainly put a new spin on Mycroft's alleged 'concern' for him.

It had been beyond stupid not to rid himself of the supply - it had seemed like a good idea at the time to keep it - it felt safe to have it as a security blanket; but god how stupid! He grasped John's hand tightly in his, trying not to shake... trying not to envision a world without John.

He choked down the knot in his throat to exclaim, "Up here!" as soon as the downstairs door was thrown open.

He waited while the paramedics made their way in and took an infuriating amount of time checking John over.

"What's the problem?" he barked after less than three minutes. "I've filled you in on all the details - body weight, substance, purity, amount, time injected - what more could you possibly need to know?!"

"We're getting his vitals, sir, we'll only be a minute more."

"You can get those _ON THE WAY!" Twats!_ He began to manoeuvre John out of the chair and toward the gurney, which spurred the remaining medics to take over from the clearly distraught madman, and to indeed, finish their assessment en route.

* * *

_"John?"_ Sherlock asked. John was still asleep.

"What did I do?

...

"It was something I did, wasn't it?

...

"I won't do it again. Tell me. Please.

...

Sherlock had somehow forgotten how to simply _be_; his insides were shattered; his fingers flitted over John's wrist, obsessively taking his pulse.

* * *

Days went by. Various promises were made. John was awake for none of them.

"I'll do the shopping.

"I'll clean the fridge.

"I'll stop stealing your laptop."

None of them were having any effect whatsoever.

"John?" His voice cracked.

"Please don't do this to me."

Then silence. Dreadful silence, but steady presence. He could do nothing else. He'd promised all he could think of, pleaded, even then knowing that promises and petitions would do, could do, nothing.

All he could do was wait.

He thinks he might have eaten. He's not sure. A vague memory of someone pushing something (possibly) edible into his hand at some point in the past...

The clock in here ticks. A lot_ (of course it does, it's a clock)_. It's the most annoying clock he's ever heard.

There was a hand on his shoulder, someone had talked to him - he'd answered in rote form. They'd left when they realised he wasn't paying attention.

The doctors are idiots. John wouldn't be an idiot.

The worst was when John started to dream. The staff said this was good, but it wasn't. He didn't scream. It wasn't like his usual nightmares.

Sometimes there were just tears. Silent.

How did one cure tears?

Talking didn't help. He did it anyway. He thinks John's subconscious may now know half of the encyclopaedia and all the facts that exist about tobacco ash.

Sometimes John muttered things. This always made his heart jump, but John was never awake. Still, Sherlock always answered.

Day after day, the drowsy-sounding, soft, slightly-confused voice would sound, "Sherlock?"

Hopeful eyes would alight upon the doctor, but he was always still asleep. "Yes, John?"

And silence. The sleep went on.

"Sherlock?"

"Yes, John?"

Silence.

And again.

And again.

And again.

One day, god only knows how many days later; he'd stopped counting...

"Sherlock?"

"Yes, John?"

...

...

"Wanker."

Being called a wanker suddenly meant more to Sherlock than any variety of praise John had ever heaped on him in the past. All at once it was his favourite moniker.

He may have cried. He can't remember now.

John slept again, but he woke again too.

And while they still have a hell of a lot to work out and work through, that's where we'll leave them for now.

* * *

End Notes:

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Comments are delicious!  
Many hugs to my readers! :)


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